It was the day set for the grand parade and picnic of “The Sons and
Daughters of Repent Ye Saith the Lord,” and, with the first light of
morning, Catfish Row had burst into a fever of preparation. Across the
narrow street, the wharf, from which the party was to leave, bustled and
seethed with life. A wagon rattled out to the pier-head and discharged
an entire load of watermelons. Under the vigilant eyes of a committee a
dozen volunteers lifted the precious freight from the vehicle, and piled
it ready for the steamer.
From behind the next pier, with a frenzied threshing of its immense
stern paddle, came the excursion boat. Tall open exhaust funnels flanked
the walking-beam, and coughed great salmon-colored plumes of steam into
the faint young sunlight. A fierce torrent of wood-smoke gushed from the
funnel and went tumbling away across the harbor. Painters were hurled,
missed, coiled, and hurled again. Then, amid a babblement of advice and
encouragement, the craft was finally moored in readiness for the Lodge.
The first horizontal rays of the sun were painting the wall a warm
claret, when Porgy opened his door, to find Peter already dressed for
the parade, and perched upon the back of his gaily blanketed horse. He
wore a sky-blue coat, white pants which were thrust into high black
leggings, and a visored cap, from beneath which he scowled fiercely down
upon the turmoil around the feet of his mount. Across his breast, from
right shoulder to left hip, was a broad scarlet sash, upon which was
emblazoned, “Repent Ye Saith the Lord!” and from his left breast
fluttered a white ribbon bearing the word “MARSHAL.” From time to time,
he would issue orders in hoarse, menacing gutturals, which no one
heeded; and twice, in the space of half an hour, he rode out to the
pier-head, counted the watermelons, and returned to report the number to
an important official who had arrived in a carriage to supervise the
arrangements.
Momently the confusion increased, until at eight o’clock it culminated
in a general exodus toward the rendezvous for the parade.
The drowsy old city had scarcely commenced its day when, down through
King Charles Street, the procession took its way. Superbly
unselfconscious of the effect that it produced, it crashed through the
slow, restrained rhythm of the city’s life like a wild, barbaric chord.
All of the stately mansions along the way were servantless that day, and
the aristocratic matrons broke the ultimate canon of the social code and
peered through front windows at the procession as it swept flamboyantly
across the town.
First came an infinitesimal negro boy, scarlet-coated, and aglitter with
brass buttons. Upon his head was balanced an enormous shako; and while
he marched with left hand on hip and shoulders back, his right hand
twirled a heavy gold-headed baton. Then the band, two score boys attired
in several variations of the band master’s costume, strode by. Bare,
splay feet padded upon the cobbles; heads were thrown back, with lips to
instruments that glittered in the sunshine, launching daring and
independent excursions into the realm of sound. Yet these improvisations
returned always to the eternal boom, boom, boom of an underlying rhythm,
and met with others in the sudden weaving and ravelling of amazing
chords. An ecstasy of wild young bodies beat living into the blasts that
shook the windows of the solemn houses. Broad, dusty, blue-black feet
shuffled and danced on the many-colored cobbles and the grass between
them. The sun lifted suddenly over the housetops and flashed like a
torrent of warm, white wine between the staid buildings, to break on
flashing teeth and laughing eyes.
After the band came the men members of the lodge, stepping it out to the
urge of the marshals who rode beside them, reinforcing the marching
rhythm with a series of staccato grunts, shot with crisp, military
precision from under their visored caps. Breast cross-slashed with the
emblems of their lodge, they passed.
Then came the carriages, and suddenly the narrow street hummed and
bloomed like a tropic garden. Six to a carriage sat the sisters. The
effect produced by the colors was strangely like that wrought in the
music; scarlet, purple, orange, flamingo, emerald; wild, clashing,
unbelievable discords; yet, in their steady flow before the eye,
possessing a strange, dominant rhythm that reconciled them to each other
and made them unalterably right. The senses reached blindly out for a
reason. There was none. They intoxicated, they maddened, and finally
they passed, seeming to pull every ray of color from the dun buildings,
leaving the sunlight sane, flat, dead.
For its one brief moment out of the year the pageant had lasted. Out of
its fetters of civilization this people had risen, suddenly, amazingly.
Exotic as the Congo, and still able to abandon themselves utterly to the
wild joy of fantastic play, they had taken the reticent, old Anglo-Saxon
town and stamped their mood swiftly and indelibly into its heart. Then
they passed, leaving behind them a wistful envy among those who had
watched them go,--those whom the ages had rendered old and wise.
§
When the exodus from the Row was completed, Bess helped Porgy out to the
boat and established him in an angle of the main-deck cabin, where he
could see and enjoy the excursion to the full. Below them on the wharf,
Maria, who had the direction of the refreshment committee in hand, moved
about among the baskets and boxes, looking rather like a water-front
conflagration, in a voluminous costume of scarlet and orange. Bess left
Porgy and descended the ladder.
“I gots a ready hand wid bundle,” she announced diffidently.
The immense negress paused, and looked her up and down.
“Well, well, it looks like yer tryin’ ter be decent,” she commented.
Instantly the woman chilled, “Yuh kin go tuh Hell!” she said
deliberately. “I ain’t axin’ fuh no sermon. I want a job. Does yuh want
a han’ wid dem package, or not?”
For a moment their eyes met. Then they laughed suddenly, loudly
together, with complete understanding.
“All right, den,” the older woman said. “Ef yuh is dat independent, yuh
kin tek dem basket on board.”
After that they worked together, until the procession arrived, without
the interchange of further remarks.
§
Down the quiet bay, like a great, frenzied beetle, the stern-wheeler
kicked its way. On the main deck the band played without cessation. In a
ring before it, a number of negroes danced, for the most part shuffling
singly. The sun hurled the full power of an August noon upon the
oil-smooth water, and the polished surface cast it upward with added
force under the awnings. The decks sagged with color, and repeated
explosions of laughter rode the heat waves back to the drowsing, lovely
old city long after the boat had turned the first bend in the narrow
river and passed from view on its way to the negro picnic grounds on
Kittiwar Island.
Thrashing its way between far-sweeping marshes and wooded sea islands,
the boat would burst suddenly into lagoon after lagoon, that lay strewn
along the coast, that blazed in the noon like great fire-opals held in
silver mesh.
Finally a shout went up. Kittiwar lay before them, thrusting a slender
wharf from its thickly wooded extremity into the slack tide.
The debarkation over, Maria took possession of a clearing that stood in
a dense forest of palmettoes and fronted on the beach, and marshalled
her committee to prepare the lunch. From the adjacent beach came the
steady, cool thunder of the sea and the unremitting hum of sand, as
tireless winds scooped it from the dunes and sent it in low, flat-blown
layers across the hard floor of the beach.
The picnickers heard it, and answered with a shout. Soon the streaming
whiteness of the inner surf was dotted with small, glistening black
bodies; the larger figures, with skirts hoisted high, were wading in the
shallows.
Porgy sat with a large myrtle bush in one hand, with which he brushed
flies from several sleeping infants. The sun lay heavy and comforting
upon him. One of the children stirred and whimpered. He hummed a low,
bumbling song to it. There was a new contentment in his face. After a
while he commenced to nod.
§
“I go an’ git some palmettuh leaf fuh tablecloth,” Bess told Maria; and,
without waiting for an answer, she took a knife from a basket, and
entered the dense tangle of palm and vine that walled the clearing.
Almost immediately she was in another world. The sounds behind her
became faint, and died. A rattler moved its thick body sluggishly out of
her way. A flock of wood ibis sprang suddenly up, broke through the
thick roof of palm leaves, and streamed away over the treetops toward
the marsh with their legs at the trail.
She cut a wide fan-shaped leaf from the nearest palmetto. Behind her
some one breathed--a deep interminable breath.
The woman’s body stiffened slowly. Her eyes half closed and were
suddenly dark and knowing. Some deep ebb or flow of blood touched her
face, causing it to darken heavily, leaving the scar livid. Without
turning, she said slowly:
“Crown!”
“Yas, yuh know berry well, dis Crown.”
The deep sound shook her. She turned like one dazed, and looked him up
and down.
His body was naked to the waist, and the blue cotton pants that he had
worn on the night of the killing had frayed away to his knees. He bent
slightly forward. The great muscles of his torso flickered and ran like
the flank of a horse. His small wicked eyes burned, and he moistened his
heavy lips.
Earth had cared for him well. The marshes had provided eggs of wild
fowl, and many young birds. The creek had given him fish, crabs and
oysters in abundance, and the forest had fed him with its many berries,
and succulent palmetto cabbage.
“I seen yuh land,” he said, “an’ I been waitin’ fuh yuh. I mos’ dead ob
lonesome on dis damn island, wid not one Gawd’s person to swap a word
wid. Yuh gots any happy-dus’ wid yuh?”
“No,” she said; then with an effort, “Crown, I gots somethin’ tuh tell
yuh. I done gib up dope; and beside dat, I sort ob change my way.”
His jaw shot forward, and the huge shoulder muscles bulged and set. His
two great hands went around her throat and closed like the slow fusing
of steel on steel. She stopped speaking. He drew her to him until his
face touched hers. Under his hands her arteries pounded, sending fierce
spurts of flame through her limbs, beating redly behind her eyeballs.
His hands slackened. Her face changed, her lips opened, but she said
nothing. Crown broke into low, shaken laughter, and threw her from him.
“Now come wid me,” he ordered.
Into the depths of the jungle they plunged; the woman walking in front
with a trance-like fixity of gaze. They followed one of the narrow
hard-packed trails that had been beaten by the wild hogs and goats that
roamed the island.
On each side of them, the forest stood like a wall, its tough low trees
and thick-bodied palmettoes laced and bound together with wire-strong
vines. Overhead the foliage met, making the trail a tunnel as
inescapable as though it had been built of masonry.
The man walked with a swinging, effortless stride, but his breath
sounded in long, audible inhalations, as though he labored physically.
When they had journeyed for half an hour they crossed a small cypress
swamp. The cypress-knees jutted grotesquely from the yellow water, and
trailing Spanish moss extended drab stalactites that brushed their faces
as they threaded the low, muddy trail.
Finally Bess emerged into a small clearing, in the centre of which stood
a low hut with sides of plaited twigs and roof of palmetto leaves laid
on top of each other in regular rows like shingles.
Crown was close behind her. At the low door of the hut she paused and
turned toward him. He laughed suddenly and hotly at what he saw in her
face.
“I know yuh ain’t change,” he said. “Wid yuh an’ me it always goin’ tuh
be de same. See?”
He snatched her body toward him with such force that her breath was
forced from her in a sharp gasp. Then she inhaled deeply, threw back her
head, and sent a wild laugh out against the walls of the clearing.
Crown swung her about and threw her face forward into the hut.
§
The sun was so low that its level rays shot through the tunnels of the
forest and bronzed its ceiling of woven leaves when Bess returned to
the clearing. She paused for a moment. Behind her, screened by the
underbrush, stood Crown.
“Now ’member wut I tells yuh,” he said. “Yuh kin stay wid de cripple
’til de cotton come. Den I comin’. Davy will hide we on de ribber boat
fur as Sawannah. Den soon de cotton will be comin’ in fas’, an’ libbin
will be easy. Yuh gits dat?”
For a moment she looked into the narrow, menacing eyes, then nodded.
“Go ’long den, an’ tote fair, les yuh wants tuh meet yo’ Gawd.”
She stepped into the open. Already most of the party were on the boat.
She crossed the narrow beach to the wharf.
Maria stood by the gangplank and looked at her with suspicious eyes.
“Wuh yuh been all day?” she demanded.
“I git los’ in de woods, an’ I can’t git my bearin’s ’til sundown. But
dat ain’t nobody’ business ’cep’ me an’ Porgy, ef yuh wants tuh know.”
She found Porgy on the lower deck near the stern, and seated herself by
him in silence. He was looking into the sunset, and gave no evidence of
having noticed her arrival.
Through the illimitable, mysterious night, the steamer took its way.
Presently it swung out of one of the narrow channels and wallowed like
an antediluvian monster into the stillness of a wide lagoon. Out of the
darkness, low, broad waves moved in upon it, trailing stars along their
swarthy backs to shatter into silver dust against the uncouth bows.
To Porgy and Bess, still sitting silent in the stern, came only the
echoes of drowsy conversations, sounds of sleeping, and the rhythmic
splash and drip of the single great wheel behind them. The boat forged
out into the centre of the lagoon, and the shore line melted out behind
it. Where it had shown a moment before, could now be seen only the
steady climb of constellations out of the water’s rim, and the soft,
humid lamps of low, near stars. The night pressed in about the two quiet
figures.
Porgy had said no word since their departure. His body had assumed its
old, tense attitude. His face wore again its listening look. Now, he
said slowly:
“Yuh nebber lie tuh me, Bess.”
“No,” came an even, colorless voice, “I nebber lie tuh yuh. Yuh gots tuh
gib me dat.”
Another interval, then:
“War it Crown?”
A sharp, indrawn breath beside him, and a whisper:
“How yuh know?”
“Gawd gib cripple many t’ings he ain’t gib strong men.” Then again,
patiently, “War it Crown?”
“Yes, it war.”
“Wut he say?”
“He comin’ fuh me when de cotton come tuh town.”
“Yuh goin’?”
“I tell um--yes.”
After a while the woman reached out a hand and closed it lightly about
the man’s arm. Under the sleeve she felt the muscles go rigid. What
power! She tried to circle it with her hand. It was almost as big as
Crown’s. It was strange that she had not noticed that before. She opened
her mouth to speak, but no sound came. Presently she sighed, and
withdrew her hand.
Through the immense emptiness of sea and sky the boat forged slowly
toward the distant city’s lights.
§
“I gots er feelin’ yistuhday,” announced Maria to Serena Robbins, as she
took a batch of wet clothing from the latter’s tub, gave it one twist
with her enormous hands, and set it aside to go upon the line.
“Wut yuh gots er feelin’ ’bout?”
“I gots er feelin’ w’en Porgy ’oman come out de wood on de picnic, she
done been wid Crown.”
At the mention of the murderer’s name Serena stepped back, and her usual
expression of sanctimonious complacency slowly changed. Her lower lip
shot forward, and her face darkened.
“Yuh t’ink dat nigger on Kittiwar?” she asked.
“I allus figgered he bin dey in dem deep palmetters,” Maria replied.
“But w’en I look in Bess’s eye las’ night, I sho ob two ting: one, dat
he is dey, an’ two, dat she been wid um.”
“Yuh b’lieb she still ran wid dat nigger?”
“Dem sort ob mens ain’t need tuh worry ’bout habin’ ’omen,” Maria told
her. “Dey kin lay de lash on um, an’ kick um in de street; den dey kin
whistle w’en dey ready, an’ dere dey is ag’in lickin’ dey han’.”
“She goin’ stay wid Porgy, ef she know wut good fuh she.”
“She know all right, an’ she lub Porgy. But ef dat nigger come attuh
she, dey ain’t goin’ tuh be noboddy roun’ hyuh but Porgy an’ de goat.”
A sudden dark flame blazed in Serena’s face, sweeping the acquired
complacency before it, and changing it utterly. She leant forward, and
spoke heavily:
“Dat nigger bes’ t’ank he Gawd dat I gots My Jedus now fuh hol’ back my
han’!”
“Yuh ain’t means dat yuh is goin’ tuh gib um up tuh de w’ite folks ef he
come back to town, ’stead ob settle wid um yu’self?’ Maria asked
incredulously.
“I ain’t know wut fuh do,” the other replied, the hatred in her face
giving way to a look of perplexity. “Ef dat nigger come tuh town he sho
tuh git kill’ sooner er later. Den de w’ite folks goin’ lock me up. Dey
gots it on de writin’s now dat I been Robbins’ wife; an’ dey goin’
figger I like as not kill um. I knows two people git lock up dat way,
an’ dey ain’t do one Gawd t’ing.”
“Nigger sho’ gots fuh keep he eye open in dis worl’,” the big negress
observed. “But we can’t turn no nigger ober tuh de police.”
A man paused before the entrance of the court, and looked in. To the two
women he was only a silhouette standing under the arch against a
dazzling expanse of bay; but the foppish outlines of the indolent,
slender figure were unmistakable.
A smile of pleased anticipation grew about Maria’s wide mouth. She
dried her hands upon her apron.
“Jus’ like I been tellin’ yuh!” she remarked to Serena. “T’ank Gawd,
Jedus ain’t gots me yit wuh he gots you; an’ I still mens enough tuh
straighten out a crooked nigger. See dat yalluh snake wrigglin’ in de
do’way? He de one wut sell Bess dat happy-dus’.”
Drying her hands and bared forearms with ominous thoroughness, she
crossed to her shop. The room was empty when she entered. She went at
once to the stove which stood in its corner, with its legs set upon four
bricks. She bent forward, placed a shoulder against one of its corners,
gave a heave, and drew out a brick. Then she straightened up, spat first
on one hand, then on the other, and, carrying the brick in her immense
right, lightly, and with a certain awful fondness, stepped out of her
door.
Sportin’ Life was now within the entrance, and presented an unsuspecting
profile to the cook-shop.
With frightful deliberation, Maria swung her long arm back; then, like
the stroke of a rattler, it shot forward. The brick caught the mulatto
full on the side of the head. He crumpled among his gaudy habiliments
like a stricken bird.
After a space of time the victim blinked feebly, then opened his eyes
upon Maria’s face. She was mopping his head with a wet rag, and his
first glance discovered an expression of gentleness on her heavy
features. Reassured, he opened his eyes wide. But the gentleness was
gone. He felt himself gripped by the shoulders, and suddenly snatched
upward to be placed upon unsteady legs. Then he was propelled rapidly
toward the gate.
At the pavement’s edge Maria swung her victim around until his wandering
and reluctant gaze met hers.
“De las’ time yuh wuz aroun’ hyuh, I ain’t hab nuttin’ on yuh but my
eyes. Now I knows yuh--yuh damn, dirty, dope-peddler, wreckin’ de homes
ob dese happy niggers!”
Her arms shot forward and back like locomotive pistons. The man’s head
snapped to an acute angle, and righted itself with difficulty.
“Now, w’en I done flingin’ yuh out dis gate,” she proceeded, “it’s de
las’ time yuh is goin’ tuh leabe it erlibe. Eberybody say I is er berry
t’orough nigger, an’ ef yuh ebber comes roun’ hyuh agin, drunk or sobuh,
I ain’t goin’ to be t’rough wid yuh carcase ontil I t’row yuh bones out
tuh de buzza’d one by one.”
Abruptly she reversed the luckless man and placed a foot in the small of
his back. Then with a heave that seemed to bring into play every muscle
of her huge bulk, she catapulted him once and for all out of Catfish Row
and the lives of its inhabitants.
V
[Illustration]